Wrote to help corporations adapt to the new requirements top infosecurity publisher 'E-Discovery and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure' is the latest in its series of Practical IT Governance pocket guides. Under the recently amended Federal Rules of Civil Procedure organizations face tough new requirements for preserving their electronically stored data, such as email and word-processing documents, so that it can swiftly be produced in the event of a lawsuit. Research shows that, while such legal demands are common for larger organizations, very few are ready for these new E-Discovery rules, leaving the majority open to costly fines and adverse rulings.
In over 68 pages, Bradley J Schaufenbuel, senior manager in IT Risk and Security at Zurich Financial Services in Illinois, provides an easily absorbed account of the background and details of the new rules and explains what organizations must do immediately to ready themselves for possible future lawsuits. IE-Discovery and the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure' is written in recognition that larger organizations are highly likely to face E-Discovery requests. 91 percent of companies with over 20,000 employees have been through an E-Discovery event in the past 12 months, according to an ESG Research. However, a recent survey of corporate attorneys by Pike and Fisher revealed that only 7 percent feel that their companies are ready to meet these new requirements.
Specifically Schaufenbuel talks about the tight timeframes in which electronic data must now be gathered and presented to opposing counsel, and how this in turn demands a far more rigorous and strategic methodology for storing corporate information on an ongoing basis. It shows the stark truth that in the eyes of the court 'ignorance is no longer bliss' and that organizations are expected to be able to retrieve electronic data as needed. It also discusses the new multi-disciplinary approach that must be adopted to comply with these demands, drawing in personnel from record management, IT, compliance and legal, to ensure that a comprehensive compliance framework is developed.
Not to adequately offer electronic data in response to a discovery request can show extremely costly. Hard consequences can involv a judge instructing a jury to assume that missing evidence would have been 'adverse' to the party failing to provide it. In a recent sexual discrimination lawsuit such an instruction led to banking group UBS having to pay $29 million to a former employee, whereas in Coleman vs Morgan Stanley a similar event saw billionaire Ronald Perelman awarded $1.45 billion against Morgan Stanley. Heavy fines and penalties may also be levied by the court, which in the case of Serra Chevrolet vs General Motors were as high as $50,000 per day for a late response to a discovery request.
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